Police easier to reach on phone

They�ve never been so easy to get on the phone, according to the latest statistics released by Police Minister Liza Harvey.

Mrs Harvey announced last week that people had embraced the idea of calling Local Policing Teams (LPTs) to discuss crime issues in their neighbourhoods, since the LPTs were given their own mobile phones nine months ago.

She said in a recent review conducted over six days that members of the public contacted the 148 LPT mobiles on 472 occasions.

�I�m encouraged the public has embraced the Local Police Team mobile phone initiative which, along with growing social media use, is helping to build on the relationship between officers and their community,� she said.

The minister also praised the professionalism of LPTs that returned 95 per cent of unanswered calls within 24 hours.

Mrs Harvey said it was important for callers to leave a message if their call went unanswered.

A key initiative of the Frontline 2020 model is each LPT having its own mobile phone number, giving members of the community the ability to ring them directly to discuss local community issues.

Mrs Harvey said the LPTs� mobile phones were to discuss only non-urgent local issues with local police.

Police phone numbers:

� Emergencies 000

� Immediate police attendance (not life threatening) 131 444

� Local Policing Teams (LPTs) (non urgent local issues): click here for a full list.